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By: OpenSRS Team on June 27th, 2008
Posted in: Announcements
Tags: Holiday Hours
Comments: 0

Next week provides the opportunity for Tucows staff on both sides of the Canada-U.S. border to celebrate the creation of our respective countries.

On Tuesday, July 1st, Canadians celebrate Canada Day and as a result, our offices in Toronto will be operating on holiday hours. On Friday, while our American friends are celebrating Independence Day, we’ll be business as usual with the exception of the Platypus team at our Starkville, Mississippi office.

Holiday Hours for Canada Day, Tuesday, July 1st:

• OpenSRS Support: Regular business hours
• Platypus Support: Regular business hours
• Payments, Compliance, Service Bureau and Special Processing: Closed

Holiday Hours for U.S. Independence Day, Friday, July 4th:

• OpenSRS Support: Regular business hours
• Platypus Support: Closed
• Payments, Compliance, Service Bureau and Special Processing: Regular business hours

Have a safe and enjoyable holiday!

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By: OpenSRS Team on June 26th, 2008
Posted in: Industry News
Tags: ICANN
Comments: 0

The 32nd International Public Meeting of ICANN has been taking place this week in Paris. As usual, Tucows was an active participant.

The big news out of Paris today was that ICANN approved new guidelines that effectively pave the way for the creation of hundreds, or even thousands of new domain extensions (the part after the ‘dot’). You can read more on the story here.

I gave Adam Eisner, Tucows’ Product Manager, Domains, a ring via Skype to get his take on the news. In addition to talking about the new domain name extensions, and how that whole process will work, Adam touched briefly on the issue of domain tasting and how ICANN is moving to reduce or eliminate the controversial practice.

Click the play button to have a listen:

[audio:http://www.opensrs.com/images/wordpress/uploads/2010/03/icann_paris.mp3]

ICANN’s 32nd Meeting wrapped up today. You can read the official news release here.

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By: Adam Eisner on June 23rd, 2008
Posted in: Reseller Resources
Tags:
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Perhaps one of the biggest advantages of our unique “cost plus” billing model is that we get registry discounts that we can extend right through to you. Because our gTLD pricing model is totally transparent, we extend as many of those registry pricing promotions as possible, directly to our resellers.

For example, we are currently offering various discounts on .MOBI, .CN, .US and .INFO domain names as a result of promotions offered by those registries. You can view a list of our current domain promotions here.

Domain name pricing promotions are a fantastic opportunity to drum up new business and solidify existing customer relationships. Among the things we’ve seen from our customers when they extend our pricing promotions to their customers:

• Sales go up: We thought that might get your attention. In some cases — for those reseller who have popular websites — simply mentioning the promotion drives great sales volumes. And every additional name sold is another opportunity to sell ancillary services like web hosting and email. By the way, giving names away for free won’t drive revenues unless they’re bundled with paid services like hosting. Those free names are much less likely to be renewed.
• Looks can be deceiving: Sometimes, resellers don’t realize they have customers in China, or customers who might be interested in the mobile Internet, until they introduce a discount for .CN or .MOBI names. The bottom line: offer as many products and discounts as possible!

If more sales sound good to you, here are some hints to get you started, based on our experience:

• Market the discount on the front page of your website: It should be noticeable to both existing and potential customers.
• Advertise the promotion in any newsletters or blogs you might have.: The more people that know about a promotion, the more people might take advantage of it.
• Keep the promotion active for a limited amount of time: In order to remain transparent, we extend discounts for their full length. So, for example, .CN has been discounted for several months now, but that doesn’t mean you have to. Limiting a discount to a month-long period should generate some urgency among your customers. Just be sure to remember to send a “hurry – time is running out!” message before the end of the promotion.

As we head into the summer, we’ve got some new discounts to be rolled out starting July 1st. Among the new discounts: a super $0 registry fee for certain .INFO domain names and lowered registry fees for .COM and .NET Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs).

Happy selling!

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By: Adam Eisner on June 18th, 2008
Posted in: Events
Tags: ICANN
Comments: 0

Next week, several of us will be in Paris for the 32nd Annual International Public ICANN meeting. As I’ve mentioned before, ICANN meetings afford us a unique opportunity to meet registries, vendors, customers and other registrars, all in one central location. A great deal of policy discussion also takes place, as does a meeting of the ICANN Registrar Constituency, of which Tucows is a member and is heavily involved.

Among the “hot-button” topics that are sure to be discussed in detail at the meeting:

• IPv6: As the number of available IP addresses under IPv4 continues to shrink, the importance of IPv6 adoption worldwide will continue to grow.
• New TLDs: Although details are still fuzzy, it is widely expected that a number of new TLDs will be introduced in the coming years. What types of TLDs are introduced and the process by which they are chosen will be discussed in detail at this meeting.
• Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs): IDNs allow international users to use web addresses in their native script, but adoption and standards thus far have been spotty and inconsistent. The need for greater adoption and standards will be discussed.
• The future of ICANN: ICANN’s role in the management of the domain name system is sure to be a major topic of discussion as its current agreement with the U.S. Department of Commerce nears its conclusion in 2009.

All signs point to the meeting being very well-attended, which will allow me to connect with even more partners, customers and vendors (particularly those based in Europe) than most conferences. In fact, my schedule from Monday through Friday is already booked solid with meetings, sessions and workshops—a telltale sign that I’m in for an extremely busy week!

You can visit the ICANN Paris Public Participation website for more information on the upcoming meeting. If you plan to be in Paris and would like to say hello, please be sure to let us know.

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By: OpenSRS Team on June 12th, 2008
Posted in: OpenSRS Services
Tags: Domains Service
Comments: 2

Tucows has just announced that it is collaborating with Afternic to auction Tucows’ large daily inventory of expired domain names. You can read the full news release with further details or visit our Reseller services site for further information.

To answer some of the questions our Resellers may have about expired domain name auctions, we’ve prepared a video with Bill Sweetman, General Manager, Domain Portfolio, Tucows.